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Auntie SparkNotes: My Sleazy Friend Is Trying to Mack on My Crush

Dear Auntie SparkNotes,

There’s this guy I’ve had a crush on for over a year now, lets call him Carter, which is actually a pretty big deal for me as I have a really really hard time seeing anybody romantically. However, I’m quite clueless when it comes to making a move so I haven’t done anything. Then one of my best guy friends, Max, started dating Carter’s younger sister. So, I tried to test the water to see if there was a way that Max could help me out with this by hinting that I was interested.

But here comes the twist. Max said he wanted to talk to me about something huge. This entailed him describing how he recently developed a massive crush on Carter, and views him and his sister as totally separate people. As of right now, he intends to keep on dating the sister. He’s also unwilling to try to quell his crush on Carter.

Now, I’m in a bit of a rut. I know it would be crossing a friend boundary to make a move on Carter, but it’s a bit frustrating for me since I can go years without finding people attractive and I actually really liked him. I also don’t feel comfortable telling Max his situation is totally okay, as it seems like he leads on the sister at times to find out more about Carter. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be this sister. Any advice on my loneliness and handling Max?

I’ll be honest, Sparkler: Before I went to answer this letter, I had to google around to make sure it wasn’t the plot of a seedy Lifetime Original Movie—something like Brothers and Sisters and Secrets and Lies, starring Sarah Hyland as the clueless little sis and Austin Abrams as your friend Max.

Which, uh, should tell you something about just how messed-up this whole situation is.

And when you ask how you should handle Max, my answer to you is that if you must handle him, it should be the way you’d handle any noxious, slimy thing: as little as humanly possible, and very, very carefully. This probably goes without saying, but decent, trustworthy people do not date one person while secretly, unapologetically scheming to get in the pants of one of their family members. UGH.

Of course, that puts you in an interesting position vis-a-vis how you deal with what Max told you, moving forward. Because seeing as your friend is in serious violation of a major tenet of not being a soulless asshat, it is far from a foregone conclusion that you need to respect his assy self by backing off your crush. You don’t actually have to do that, you know? The guy doesn’t have claimsies on Carter just because he’s been harboring secret feels for him (while wooing his little sister, no less) — and you have no obligation to abandon your crush, especially not for the sake of abetting him in his totally icky endeavors.

All together (and not to mention the statistical improbability that Carter even likes guys that way, let alone guys who’ve dated his sister), Auntie SparkNotes personally sees no good reason why you shouldn’t pursue him, if that’s what you want.

You’ll just need to rethink the part where you ask this particular friend to help you do it.

So, with that in mind, two suggestions:

First, give yourself permission to disengage from whatever the heck Max is doing, which is a) an absolute mess of drama, and b) none of your business anyway. (If he brings it up again, just tell him you think what he’s doing is really uncool and you don’t want to hear about it.)

And second, yank up your confidence pants and go after the guy you like the old-fashioned way: By flirting with him, face to face, and seeing if he returns your interest. Which, in addition to the benefit of not involving a moral derelict in your love life, makes it just so much more fun and exciting if and when things work out between you.

Got something to say? Tell us in the comments! And to get advice from Auntie, email her at advice@sparknotes.com.
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